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  • From: John S <swim_at_svc@yahoo.com>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] autumn olive Now "Invasive plants"
  • Date: Fri, 11 Sep 2009 04:21:55 -0700 (PDT)

Donna,  I'm not sure what side of the issue you are on from this post.

I do want to observe, however, that just because a plant colonizes a disturbed area, such as the field around the house you mentioned, does not make that an invasive species in my mind.  The invasion, in my mind, occurred when the owners of the property most likely farmed the property.

Likewise, a large group of plants occurring in an area does not necessarily indicate an invasive species.  Few of us would regard a stand of oaks, for example, as evidence that oaks are invasive.

John



--- On Thu, 9/10/09, Kieran &/or Donna <holycow@frontiernet.net> wrote:

From: Kieran &/or Donna <holycow@frontiernet.net>
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] autumn olive
To: "Hector Black" <hblack1925@fastmail.fm>, "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Thursday, September 10, 2009, 11:15 PM

My position on autumn olives was similar to Hector's till we went on a trip over the mtns to Virginia and saw whole fields that had been completely taken over by autumn olive.  One place looked like about 5 acres of autumn olive with an abandoned house in the middle, the plants came up to the eaves.  But still, I expect them to be a problem in degraded areas:  logged woods and abandoned fields.  I don't think they would stand up to a lot of browsing animals,  as any N fixer is going to have higher N content than plants around them.  We are about to find out I guess.  Our dogs have done a good job of keeping deer away (think there must be some poaching as well, as we really aren't overrun with them).  So for 15 years we have had no browsing or grazing on our property, and I'm tired of doing it all by hand.  So we got 2 fainting goats that had been on pasture.  It is weird to watch goats eat grass!  Out milk goats considered grass to be famine food.  So far the fainters have figured out that they like mimosa, sumac, honeysuckle and poor Mr. Blackberry.  They don't seem too interested in my hazels, nor have I seen one bite taken out of an autumn olive.  But give them time, they are just learning about real goat food.   Donna

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